


Who I Am

by freddiejoey



Category: Arthur of the Britons
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-31
Updated: 2011-08-31
Packaged: 2017-10-23 07:21:49
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,151
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/247669
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/freddiejoey/pseuds/freddiejoey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The ghost of Benedicta lingers.......</p>
            </blockquote>





	Who I Am

Part One

The morning that Llud and I first see her, I am trying to fathom who I really am. Why I am not certain – then or now. Perhaps, because a day ago, we were involved in a short but brutal skirmish with a group of maundering Saxons.

One of them was very young, not even shaving yet to judge by his soft skin and puny limbs. Still a gangling youth, not ready to be a blooded warrior. I know because I looked into his terrified blue eyes as I slashed his throat. Not old enough to be a seasoned soldier, certainly not old enough to die in a green field on an unseasonably bright day.

His death, although unavoidable, has somehow unsettled me. Killing an almost-boy Saxon.........So, as Llud and I ride along scouting the eastern boundary, we talk. About my singularity as “Kai the Saxon who fights with Arthur”. About whether yesterday’s raw kill could have been my blood kin. About the future. And, of course, as always, about Arthur………

As always too, Llud is reassuring and calm – the best of fathers. In a rather labyrinthine way, he asks if Arthur and I have been happy recently. He is aware that Arthur has been a little out of sorts – the failure to conclude a treaty with Cerdig a few months ago hit him hard. In that Arthur is somewhat of a Roman – perhaps forgiving anything in himself but failure………

I answer honestly that I think so and Llud gives a rueful smile. “You don’t think that you’re happy,” he says, lips twitching in amusement, “you either are or you’re not. Now, which is it Kai?” With a sigh, I open my mouth to answer, when off in the distance we see Benedicta stumble and fall……..

From the start I am aware of her striking beauty – those wide haughty eyes, that burnished hair, what promises to be creamy mounds of fragrant flesh under her voluminous blue mantle. But then I am no soothsayer to discern the canker beneath the bloom.

“What you need is a warm fire.” Our kind courteous father. Thus, are condemned men consigned to their fate…….

As to the question of happiness and whether I should have answered Llud’s question in the affirmative……..

Well, I am more than happy when my little brother and I are like we were last night once Llud visited Olwen. His hard cock pressed against my warm body, his hot tongue lashing my lips, diving into my mouth, claiming me………Yes, far, far more than happy - ecstatic, euphoric, complete……..and afterwards, as we whisper pledges of love to each other……….words are utterly unworthy………..

Yet less than happy about other things. Arthur is so disappointed about the failure of his pact with Cerdig. Frequently withdrawn. Commonly irascible. If I question him, I will only receive a snappish answer more often than not. Later, a melting kiss in apology perhaps. But I would prefer the kiss on its own merits, without the preceding irritability. Then there is the whole vexed issue of his capricious feelings for Rowena which are also forbidden territory lately………

At any rate, Benedicta does nothing more than amuse me at first. Her disdainful list of demands clearly annoys Arthur – even as he and I look at each other in laughing complicity. “I’ll show you your hut.” A simple statement. No undertones of ambiguity as there may have been with so many other men, entering confined quarters with a winsome woman. Even me – by fucking Athena and the furies – in the beginning.

For all intents, Benedicta is simply a passing joke. A momentary diversion. An ephemeral entertainment. Never destined to be anything more………

 

You see, I miscalculate right from the start. Of course, I dislike and mistrust her on sight, when she first rides through the palisade. But then I would abhor any beautiful woman Kai brought home on horseback.

No, it is because I am so busy observing Kai’s – even Llud’s – fascination with Benedicta that I completely ignore or overlook Arthur’s.

Arthur and women…..well…..not much to tell really. He is very skilled at certain things as I can personally attest. Yet otherwise……a few girls here and there……an escapade or two……..and then Rowena and………….Rowena. All signed and sworn as far as me and the rest of the village is concerned.

So, I am oblivious, detesting Benedicta because of the supercilious way she regards Olwen’s cooking lessons, her haughty depreciation of us Celts, her generally scornful demeanour………to say nothing of Kai’s hungry gaze lingering upon her stupid breasts, her ridiculous hair, her no-doubt twisted twat.

Once or twice I note how often Arthur seems to visit her hut: to see if she can skin a rabbit, to hurl water over her, to check if she is eating adequately – in fact, for a dozen other superfluous reasons. Yet, foolishly, not drawing any plain conclusions. Not sensing the looming anguish for Kai.

Then one afternoon, a few weeks after Benedicta’s arrival, I am returning from the store hut with an armful of rabbit and cabbage, ready for supper. That is when I mark Arthur standing quietly outside the wall of Benedicta’s hut, almost invisible to the quickly glancing eye since his brown tunic blends so well with the wicker.

At first I do not know what he can possibly be doing. I even walk a few steps forward, put out my hand to gesture a greeting.

And then I realise and my blood runs cold. He is spying………

 

She has a huge tub of hot water waiting, steaming. As I watch through the plaited willow, Benedicta pours some aromatic oil into the bath – then pulls off her gown and shift in one fluid graceful motion. Her naked body is magnificent – firm and lithe and silken. When she bends toward the tub, I see the soft ripe swell of her arse and the outline of her velvet honeypot lips.

Benedicta’s breasts are pink-tipped twin orbs, brazenly floating as she lowers herself into the rippling water. I catch a flash of her bush – curly, abundant, the colour of liquid honey - the sensuous curve of her slender legs, her tight flat stomach.

Suddenly I feel myself growing huge and rigid……….I have a vision of walking up behind her, seizing her taut arse cheeks in my palms, bringing my lips to her groin, using my tongue to separate her glowing lower lips…………

There is a sharp footfall behind me. Lenni, hefting a basket of supper.

Hurriedly I withdraw, striding to the privy, giving into temptation, coming with a great gush and a stricken heart………..

 

My loins may still twitch when the supercilious Roman temptress walks by – well, I am still a man and she is a comely woman – but something else twitches too, even more meaningfully. My old hunter’s nose. Trouble ahead. Grave trouble at that.

The last time it quivered truly toward Mark and Herrick’s plotting at the Games. Now I doubt its veracity even less…….

 

Yorath and I are preparing to ride north when the messenger arrives. There has been a rebellion among his petty chieftains. So, a few heads need to be knocked together, Yorath has to stamp and yell and huff, the might of the Celtic alliance will be sternly invoked.

Speaking of Celts………My heart thumps, fit to burst, when I see that the parchment is from Arthur. His recent indifference has drenched my sheepskins nightly for the last few months. Yet when I open the scroll it seems that my forbearance may have been rewarded.

Quite a curt little note. Nothing revelatory. No scorching declarations of loyalty and intent. But in a soft doeskin pouch………….a fine pair of gold hoop earrings, adorned with Eros.

Eros – the son of Aphrodite, Greek god of love and passion.

I smile all the way north, feeling cherished and warm, wrapped around by sentiment and pledges.

How am I to guess that it is Kai who has secretly slipped in the gift……..acting out of compassion and pity?

 

Of course, I pretend to dislike Benedicta initially. To placate Kai and perhaps myself. But, from the moment, my brother first ushers her mockingly into the longhouse, the hankering is there – and the enthrallment.

It is why I haunt her hut, pay her so much needless attention, make silly jests about her assisting Nero. I cannot label the feeling – a moon-sickness, a madness, a captivation, an obsession………

If asked, I would say that Kai and I are happy. By night and day. He is my big brother and my beloved. Apart from him, I am only half of a whole. I love him as I breathe. Why then……….?

Truly I do not know. Where Rowena is concerned, I am more certain. She has begun to grow impatient. Everyone is expecting the announcement of a betrothal, the imminence of a wedding. Some mornings when I wake up, I believe I am ready. Yes, it makes sense by right of strategy and reason. And I do love her in my way. I would have killed Mark rather than let him have her. She loves me – that is one certainty. Yet, on other mornings, I find the whole notion of marriage oppressive. “I’m not so sure I want to get married,” I said to Llud in Mark’s village and I am still unsure………

For a time I try and fight this delirium. How can I possibly want Benedicta when Kai and I share a bed? She is scornful and snobbish and lofty. He is beautiful and unwavering and wondrous. But still the fever does not abate. Still I long to possess her, body and soul.

Then one day I glimpse her nakedness through the wicker – and after that, I am completely lost……….

Fate……luck………nemesis……what you will, hurtles onward. Benedicta cuts her hand, Kai laughingly mentions the cyrus leaves that serve as a cure and outside I hear the whickering of an affronted horse………

Teaching her to ride, all the while I picture her glorious nakedness, all pale, glistening, throbbing…….

Blue fragments of cloth……….superstitious Celtic nonsense…………rampant desire.

Kai is my heart and yet I am swept away, unable to battle any longer, vanquished and surrendering.

On that windy hill, I kiss her and everything is transformed………..

 

Part Two

The last time we make love then……………

I know that Arthur has already spent several nights with Benedicta. And yes, I am surprised, considering what I judged to be his initial distaste for her. But, I dismiss it as merely a final fling before he plights his troth to Rowena. None of it concerns me unduly. I like Rowena - she’s feisty and tough, exactly what I want in a sister. Besides, I still couple with a woman from time to time and it never makes me love Arthur one sliver less.

Perhaps, if pressed, I would say that he has been somewhat distracted………

Yet this night is wonderful – and memorable for so many reasons…….. Arthur is exceptionally tender at first. Soft whimpers escape me as Arthur gently kisses my face, melting as his mouth devours mine. Sliding his slender legs up until they are hitched around me, he rubs his beautiful rigid cock against my throbbing groin, so hot and wet already that he leaves a sodden patch on my breeches.

Franticly, I tear at the woollen fabric, freeing my own thrusting prick, feeling my balls bulge and my shaft buttress further. Now Arthur kisses me hard, his mouth seeking my stiffened nipples, biting them through the linen of my shirt, licking and sucking.

Suddenly we are two primordial muscular beasts, bucking and moaning, ripe as two juicy swollen berries, bellowing and plunging………..

His taut brimming length enters my puckered hole like a homecoming……….and afterward, we fall asleep entwined in each other’s arms.

How am I to guess that it is also a farewell of sorts…………….?

 

Yorath is pacing outside my door. Back and forth, back and forth, smacking his riding crop rhythmically against his burly thighs. Whatever does the silly man want?

My fingers are itching to throw something at his head because I am so intensely irritated. In fact I have just wrapped my hand around an inoffensive pottery cup when, finally, he knocks. Discreetly. Almost hesitantly. For some reason my heart starts to race. Has he come to tell me that he's ill or dying?

“Daughter.” Yorath's face is gentle, every bit of its usual jovial sarcasm suppressed. Today, at least, I will not be chicken brain. Now though my heart is thudding fit to throttle me.

“Well, out with it Father. Is there something the matter with you? You haven't been marching half the morning for nothing.” He puts a solacing arm around my shoulders – and I endeavour to remember the last time he made such a gesture. Something is very very wrong........

“No Rowena, all is well with me. But there are rumours.......” Yorath pauses, as if uncertain how to continue. And all at once I am drenched in fear. Arthur. Slain in battle, perished of a fever, victim of an assasin's knife.........

“It's Arthur isn't it? Dead? Whatever it is, tell me. Tell me now.” I do not realise how tightly I am gripping his wrist until I see my father wince in pain. Then he takes my hand properly in his, tenderly stroking my fingers.

“Not dead, daughter. No, although perhaps you will think......” Softly rubbing the short ends of hair on my forehead. “No, it seems that Arthur is getting married.....”

 

Kai is in anguish and I am helpless to allay it. Arthur has been enchanted by the shrewish Roman she-fox. Attempts to speak sense into him only end with that obdurate blue stare and a stubborn tightening of the fine mouth which was also Vala’s.

When he strides imperiously into our sleeping chamber, discarding his cloak, directing Kai to summon the abbot and me to take the place of Benedicta’s father………

I will always be proud of Kai in that moment. His self-worth holds firm although his heart must be wretched. There are jests of us all being fools, Arthur landing in a heap on his bed, brotherly rough and tumble that cannot be faulted.

Yet if he thinks I am already so hard of hearing that I have not harkened to his stifled weeping over the past weeks……………

Again I have undervalued……..my elder son’s heart is not wretched. It is shivered and blighted, perhaps beyond mending. As will be Rowena’s. As is mine………..

 

Her warm naked body presses against my yielding flesh, my hard cock stroking her willowy leg, her clever patrician hands rubbing up and down my arching back, gently squeezing my arse. I want her so badly………

Benedicta breathes me in, smiling at the day’s sweat and my aromatic shaving oil. She has plucked her honeypot today, leaving only a little bristle of honey hair above her glistening lips. Moaning, she kisses me, brushing her slick twat across my stomach. Giggling, she gestures toward the slithery trail of hot juice it has left in its gleaming wake. ‘It’s ready to burst Arthur.”

Trembling with lust, I place my hands on her pumping hips, guiding my frenzied prick toward her gaping honeypot, enshrining the future in alabaster and marble……

 

I almost swoon from relief when I see Nestor the Roman and his quartet of centurions stride through the palisade. At last! Rescue! For Kai’s heart. For the villagers who so detest the idea of that harpy princess wedding their leader. For me, since I may at last get a decent night’s rest, instead of lying wakeful, weeping because Kai weeps.

It will be an age before I forgive Arthur for this aberration. But in time………

And, at least, now we can make a beginning. I would be humming if I could, as I sauce the venison and skin the sweet chestnuts. Fool that I am……..

 

My decision is made. Once Arthur is married, I will travel to Cornwall. Join Mark’s war band. I have a strong axe arm and I will be welcome, despite our past disputes. Leaving Llud……..of that I cannot bear to think yet.

So I sit at the longhouse table with Arthur at the head, our father and Nestor opposite, the harridan from hell beside me. Ridiculously wearing the ring bequeathed to me by Yorath as a token of the trust that has now been trampled into the rushes. I have visions of knotting that unbound hair around her creamy throat and yanking until she chokes, some palliation for my dead heart………

Benedicta waxes on like a lilting slattern about the paradise that is Rome, ludicrous coloured statues of Minerva, her princely father’s lavish generosity. Then she turns in a proprietary manner toward Arthur. “You will love Rome…….”

Time ceases, grinds to stillness, like a grist-mill shearing grain……  
And Arthur answers, “I believe so……..yes……..it is a love you can teach me…….”

The rest in sharp-cornered shards and shreds………..

It is not unknown for a chieftain to set aside his leadership. Recently one of Hecla’s brothers did so to become a priest. But in Arthur’s case, the utter opposite. As Llud so accurately noted, “Lovesick yes, monk no.”

Mark is called for since there are weighty matters to be negotiated and he is Arthur’s nearest male kin. Our village will become a Cornish thraldom. I could not care if it becomes a Pictish roundhouse. Dying in battle would be a welcome relief…….

And ironically Llud and I will not now need to build ourselves a new hut. An irrelevant point anyway. Arthur has inhabited Benedicta’s since asking her to marry him.

I spend my time scouting on the most far-flung boundaries. Only coming home to attend a meeting of warriors where Mark presents his plans for the village defences. Sitting, head bowed, not deigning to look at Arthur, who is deserting his people after so many high-handed, high-minded assertions about loyalty, sense and reason.

 

Afterwards, as I stumble toward Leesa’s hut, seeking solace, I feel a heavy hand on my shoulder. Mark. “I’m sorry for your loss Kai……” and I suddenly know that he means so much more than being bereft of a chieftain……… Biting back the hot rush of tears. Nodding politely. Fucking Leesa as if the end of world is nigh ……..because indeed it is.

The next morning. Llud embracing me in the refuge of the stables. “Come back to me Kai. I have lost two sons already. I cannot bear to lose a third.” My weeping acknowledgement, wondering how I will ever see to ride…………

 

I follow his horse into the woods. The ground is muddy and the air bitter. He lies on the sodden leaves, sobbing like a hungry angry baby, stuffing his fists into his mouth. Quietly I kneel beside him, holding him amid the muck and mire, rocking him tenderly, loving him more than life. Certain that he does not want me nor never will……

 

It’s not that I am not tempted now. When I visit our healer Cath, entreating a sleeping draught, she gives it readily. Why not? Every woman can truly claim female ills. Besides, gossip is abounding - the state of my heart is no secret. He is the love of my life – although I have always known that I will never be his. Yet that I can accept……….never this………another woman………. And deserting his people for lust of her……….

Oh, perhaps I could bear it if he were simply wedding her. No, I lie, it would still be unbearable. But, so often, he has preached to us all about the sanctity of leadership, the need to sacrifice for the common good……..and now he is running away to Rome, evading all responsibility, making us all look like fools.

Three days and a night it sits on my bedside chest. The potion, shining in its glass phial, to be used sparingly. The potion, that if downed all at once, would end my torment forever.

Once, twice, thrice, my trembling fingers reach out to clasp, to unstop – and three times they are sharply drawn back. While I weep at my cowardice.

Yet, in the end, I cannot do it – to Yorath, for whom I am all, despite his waspish tongue, Llud and Kai who have always been so welcoming, to kind Lenni, even to Cath who could be accused of aiding me.

Let him forsake his people, sail for Rome, marry his accursed Princess of the blood, believe he will be happy.

He will never be happy without Kai……..

I realise suddenly that if he can even contemplate such things, then Arthur and I have never really known each other for a heartbeat.

I am a Jute princess. A woman born to be queen. I am my father’s daughter. And I will survive……….

At least until I have made suitable arrangements to compensate Yorath………… until I hear that Kai is married perhaps or at any rate happier………..until, until, until…………..it is time and I finally put the phial to my lips and taste its eternal nectar……….

 

There are a few last things.

Returning to the village to find that Arthur and Benedicta have already visited the Abbot at Gleben and are married.

Him approaching me as I sway drunkenly against the palisade, under the cold stars. “Kai, I leave tomorrow. Before then…..” Turning quickly, slamming my fist savagely into his beautiful face. Feeling numb as he hits the frozen ground with a resounding thud and I stalk away.

Then the next day he is gone………

As I say, I have been trying to fathom who I am.

Now, without Arthur, I know at last.

I am nothing…..I am nobody……..I do not exist at all.

 

Part Three

I wake up lying beside the hearth on a pile of fleeces, the fire burning low but still comforting, wrapped in my piebald cloak, my head quietly throbbing. Obviously I have crawled here late last night in my drunken stupor, seeking warmth, seeking solace, seeking what is now forever forfeit…………

Pulling my cloak as close and tight as a shroud, I bury my face deep in the sheepskins and weep, stifling the heaving sobs lest Llud hears. He too is grief-stricken and heartsore; he too has lost something more precious to him than the greatest hoard of monastery silver ever buried in an earth barrow. We have only each other now and my father does not need the attendant burden of trying to begin anew amid my ceaseless tears. I must be strong, straight, dry-eyed………..at least by day……..

Yet I simply do not see how………

I cannot live, breathe, be, without a heart……

There are firm footsteps approaching. Undoubtedly Lenni. I would know her determined walk anywhere. So I will have to rise, pretend to be still living, muster some semblance of existence………..she will want the hearth for cooking.

Slowly I prepare for her onslaught, still huddled, trying to wipe some of the snot and tears from my face with the corner of my cloak, realising that I no longer care. Do not care who sees or what they think of a weeping warrior. Do not care for anything – nor ever will again……….

“Daddy.” Startled I look up into my own brown eyes. A gleefully smiling blonde girl child, perhaps five, hands on hips. “Mummy signed you would end up here and she was right. Is your head thumping like a blacksmith’s anvil as well?” My mind is still too heavy and dream-laden to fathom what……….?

There is a low groaning behind me, a familiar snuffling of coming awake. I whip around, looking feverishly over my shoulder.

Arthur………clutching his tousled black head, rubbing his face remorsefully. Hardly daring to breathe, I put out a tentative hand, feel the soft skin of his cheek, the early-morning rasp of ebony stubble shadowing his lean jaw. He seems real and robust enough. But how then…..?

“Little brother, you’re here.” In a voice full of wonder and love…….

Arthur grins ruefully. “Yes big brother, neither of us made it to the sleeping chamber last night. One of the few times we both outdrunk Llud – without his capacity for recovery.” Then he looks at me more closely. “Are you alright my Kai? You have reddened eyes………My stupid bloody fault……I’m sorry……I should never……..” I make a quick deprecating gesture. Cuff him gently. “ Don’t be silly. Too much mead and not enough slumber. Nothing more.”

The demented nightmare though still refusing to disentangle its vivid scaly talons…….

“Arthur, you will love Rome.”

Time ceases, grinds to stillness, like a grist-mill shearing grain……

My brother’s careful smile.

And Arthur answers, “As you will love the night air…….”

A bedevilling mosaic of truths: the gold Eros hoops secreted by me in Rowena’s scroll…….Arthur and I making fierce love, feeling like a homecoming for me, seemingly a leave-taking for him………Lenni’s arms wrapped around me amid the wet leaves since my heart is breaking, not though because Arthur is deserting his people…….

And fabrications: Rowena’s phial……….Mark’s sympathy……….Llud’s tearful embrace…………

Afterwards……..mending and renewing……....still scars to heal at Yuletide………still the tempest to brave and conquer……… reclaiming my beloved……..Benedicta’s second coming………Lenni’s magic and the power of Arthur’s love………..bringing me eventually to now.

I shake my head violently, irrespective of its already parlous state, trying to clear the last incubus remnants.

With a jubilant laugh, a plump brown-haired toddler launches herself into Arthur’s arms, knocking him backwards again into the fleeces. “ Oh steady Shannyn, your father is rather fragile this morning.”

Of course………Maeve and now Kaitlin spinning in dizzying circles beside the table, their skirts and hair billowing, two precious exotic flowers with flying petals.

Shannyn screaming with mirth as Arthur tickles her mercilessly. “Stop Daddy………please stop.” More helpless chuckling. The sounds of boys’ voices – my boys and Luc – from the bedroom. Llud’s laughing answer.

Lenni’s decisive footsteps - for real this time, not our daughter’s sturdy replicas - handing me baby Ren. “You two geese will have to move. I have breakfast to get. Serve you right if your heads are banging. You almost drank the mead barrel dry, silly things.” Her glance of exasperated love. Rowena smirking at Arthur and blushing like a raw girl, when he teasingly kisses her on his way past.

All absolute and everyday and usual.

A delusional night terror then. Benedicta and her fatal enthrallment. But seemingly substantial enough to make me believe, to wake me up weeping as if my heart had been forever riven………..

Clambering to the table, I sit where I sat on a long-ago night when we shared our food and drink with the Romans, suddenly grateful for the certainty of my thudding head, the vitality of the dark-haired bundle, gurgling in my lap.

Then……..the sight of my beautiful little brother, coming back through the doors, his raven hair sodden from a dousing in the water trough. His midnight-blue eyes twinkling at me, glowing with promise. Tangible……..undeniable…….. mine………

 

Something has been wrong with Kai this morning. More than a surfeit of rich new mead would warrant. He’s chuckling freely enough – but somehow too freely. As if in compensation or overwhelming relief.

I could somehow swear too that he has been weeping. Although he is not usually a maudlin drunk. A nightmare then, brought on by weariness and honey ambrosia. Kai is prone to them sometimes. Often I wonder if it is because the advent of his life is enshrouded by haze.

Or perhaps not……..The causes of his ordeals have generally been clear enough. As today.

Little I can do where this one is concerned. Hellish Benedicta. There will always be some vestiges of scabbing………..

And the blame not really to lie at Arthur’s door now – he was only being normally hospitable. Helping others which Llud rightly says is in his blood.

Briskly I round up the boys. Handing Theo a platter of fruit, Cedric a pitcher of mead, Luc a basket of new warm bread. “Here, take these up to your cousin Mark and the Roman.”

Then I turn to Kai, doing all I can, placing one hand over my heart, another over his. He slips his arm around my waist, laughing softly at Ren’s antics. It is more than enough – it is more than anything……..

 

Yesterday we rode down to the estuary, Arthur and I, followed by Kaitlin and Luc on their sturdy ponies. A windy, cloud-tossed, pale-sky day but the Greek trader is in and the sailors have set up their booths on the beach. So, the only chance to get the pick of the goods before they reach the Cornish markets.

I walk up and down among the other impatient buyers, enjoying the novelty of choice, Kaitlin grumbling because her basket is becoming heavy, Luc grouching because basket-hauling is only for girls and Theo and Cedric have been allowed to remain at home with the men. Kaitlin then remarking tartly that their father is a man and he’s here. Luc retaliating that Arthur is bartering for blades and belts, not spices and fabric, not womanly things.

A few times I notice a rather handsome, strongly built man with dark wavy hair looking at us curiously, studying the children closely. One of the merchants in authority. Wearing a good quality leather tunic and fine woollen trousers. Then Arthur comes striding back, the brisk sea breeze whipping his cloak and hair, smiling complacently because he is gripping a sack full of bounty.

“Arthur if I’m not mistaken.” A quiet cultured voice behind him. Arthur’s blue eyes widen in surprise and he turns to observe the inquisitive merchant, hand outstretched in greeting. “Nestor……….it’s………unexpected.” My husband’s tone is cautious as he clasps the other man’s fingers. Already I can discern from his accent that Nestor is an educated Roman. Therefore, someone associated with Vala, Arthur’s mother – although I have never heard his name mentioned before – or……… perhaps someone linked to that other Roman strumpet……..

Nestor gives what seems like a genuinely friendly smile. “Yes, well, times change and needs must. It became a little perilous to bear the legionary aquila any longer – and I have a family to feed.” I see Arthur’s tense shoulders relax, a deep breath escaping. This man may represent past disquiet of some kind – but clearly not menace.

They talk politely for a few moments, share a joke about the Venti being angry, provoking the crisp wind. Then Arthur turns to me, smiling too now – although I still sense his reluctance. Somehow he is not easy being the congenial host here. “The Greek trader is staying in our estuary tonight. I have asked Nestor to enjoy the hospitality of our village. As he has once before long ago…….And he can share the guest quarters with Mark. Always lively company.”

As we ride home – Nestor now on my frisky Jute mare, Luc and I sharing his colt - I hear snatches of their conversation, carried back on the swirling breeze. Although most of my attention is concentrated on Kaitlin and Luc, squabbling like Garet and Gawain, over who should lead the pack pony. “……..she and her husband and son……..nothing left in Gaul……….towards Byzantine last I heard…… many have fled eastwards……..”

So, a former attendant of the Roman trollop, obviously not of her rank or station. The whore patrician princess……never a threat to me the second time she swooped…….who almost destroyed my mind, my life and my heart the first time……..vanquished by Arthur’s love for his people and the fortitude of Kai’s heart….

When we clear the rise above the village, all at once I am flooded by joy. I realise that the howling wind is simply a minstrel’s lulling melancholy ballad, that the children’s bickering sounds like the sweetest plucking of a kithara. Let them spat.

We are here together, daring to chase our dreams with sweet bravery. The pack pony will arrive home safely…….as always will we…….

 

Kai and I are bringing a new barrel of mead down from the store hut when Arthur, Rowena and the children ride in. Mark is here, with his proposals for the forthcoming Saxon treaty, and his hearty appetites – therefore the barrel will be vital for our comfort as much as his.

Looking up, Kai’s face breaks into a brilliant smile, his eyes twinkle – as they inevitably do when he sees his brother. Then I watch him go pale…………

Arthur is dismounting in front of the longhouse, laughing at something that Lenni is gesturing, calling to Luc to tether the pack pony securely. But he is not alone.

Suddenly I recognize the Roman Nestor, from another lifetime. Certainly not a primus pilus centurion any more. A merchant of some type from his dress. Still with the same straight refined bearing though, the same soldierly demeanour as he sits Rowena’s horse.

Yet, after all these years, with such an ephemeral reminder, Kai’s hands are still trembling as he lowers the barrel. His skin ivory-waxen against his fair hair. Oh my poor beloved son. Even now………..

Before supper, he and Arthur walk down to the palisade together, murmuring, cosseting. At such times all they need or want is each other – it has ever been the only remedy anyway.

And tonight I have watched them become more drunken than I have seem them for the longest time. They are, no doubt, ripe for intoxication – exhausted from months of travelling and treaty-making since Baden Hill, more days in the saddle than not, hours of tedious negotiation with the likes of Hereward and Rolf.

Lenni notices of course and Rowena throws Arthur a few concerned glances. But if an ample bellyful of mead each helps…….. Nestor’s presence has obviously unsettled Kai badly, although the man himself is not at fault. Merely the memories he evokes. And it would have been churlish not to offer hospitality.

My sons will no doubt find a resolution together and all will be well again. A timely warning though that some wounds do not scar over as completely as others…….

For some indeterminate reason I am reminded of the last night Eithna shared the longhouse table as our hostage, the night before the fight beside the lake……….

Utterly different matters of course………..probably Mark being here has simply reminded me of Bavick’s daughter since she is now the Cornish queen and he boasts of her and their children throughout the evening. Nothing more than an old man’s erratic fancy…….but perchance unease always wears the same irksome guise…….

At any rate, Mark’s usual rambunctious preening keeps Nestor entertained – as his own colourful tales of life, trading at sea, divert us, especially the children. Even appear to interest Kai. Nestor has worked along the rivers of Gaul and Germania, bartering with the barbarians and savages, learning the exotic ways of the Visigoths and Vandals. Recently though, he has begun sailing the Channel route. It is more profitable and dependable. Probably he will move his family to Londinium – a good sound base for a merchant, even if the town is somewhat rougher than under Roman sway……….

This morning I stand with him outside the longhouse while a groom fetches Rowena’s horse. A pleasant enough man, Nestor. Much less arrogant than the first time he came here, seeking a proud shipwrecked Roman princess, thankfully purging that canker from our lives. An astute vendor now, providing for his wife and children, as best he can, in an increasingly uncertain world.

Nestor clasps my good hand, smiling. “My thanks to you and your sons. It was very nice to enjoy a night ashore, good company, excellent food and wine, Mark’s jovial sagas.” I smile wilily in response. “No doubt far taller than anything you regaled us with last night, concerning gigantic whales and fantastic pepper-gatherers.”

Then the inevitable question, strange not to ask it, considering the opaque depths of that far-off farewell, precisely where we stand this morning……… “And Princess Benedicta, do you ever hear of her? We traded for a time with her husband’s estates in Gaul and the trade continues, but their lands have passed into the hands of a Frankish tribe.”

Carefully, Nestor straightens his horse’s sheepskin seat. “As I told Arthur, constantly fleeing eastwards with her husband and son I believe. Refusing to accept the inevitable. Adapt and change.” He grimaces sadly. “What did you say once Llud? That Rome will forgive anything except failure? Ironic really since imperial Rome itself has failed and is no more. Unlike you tenacious islanders who survive simply because you have learned the lessons we Romans can’t - or won’t. You make your accommodations, let go, refuse to cling to the wreckage of crumbling traditions. I’m trying to learn how to follow your example. Benedicta and her kind never will.”

Decisively he swings on to horseback, taking one last look around the village. “Hopefully I will see you again next year.” The wind blusters again in a bitter gust and I pull my cloak close. “May your gods go with you Nestor. A safe and profitable journey.” He smiles down at me. “Thank you. And may I also say something? You are one of the luckiest and richest men that I know Llud. You have a home worth fighting for, a loving family, a hearth to cleave to. Would that we all so fortunate.” With one final nod of his head, Nestor kicks the horse forward and rides out the palisade, followed by our groom.

I stand, musing, for a moment, listening to the everyday, work-a-day life of the village, watch Olwen coming toward me, her hand ready to slip into mine, hear Kai’s boys arguing in strident tones from the stables, Kaitlin suddenly chiming in with her father’s emphatic obstinacy. Clearly they require their grandfather’s parleying skills.

Yes, Nestor is almost utterly right in his judgement, wrong by just one measure. I am not one of the luckiest and richest men in the world – I am simply the luckiest and richest, growing luckier and richer with each passing hour……..

 

Part Four

I am culpable again. Inviting Nestor the Roman back to the village. Needing to be Arthur the hospitable and courteous. Unfailingly helpful and practical. Instead of putting Kai's needs first and leaving the man to his boat cabin. What difference one night ashore?

All I have done, oh so successfully, all over again, is renew a weal across Kai's heart. I am very skilled at that, since I have done it often enough, with my pride and self-sufficiency. And I, more than most, know the lingering power that the past retains – any stray reminder of my mother, for instance………..

Moreover, who is always there, with wide open arms and wide open heart, when I am prostrated by anguish………..Kai

I love Kai and I’m irrevocably in love with him. He is my life and heart, my every breath.  
And I love Rowena for her spirit, her courage and fire. No man could ask for more.

How then to explain Benedicta’s malevolent allure?

Believe me I have tried. Tried and so often failed. There are excuses I could make – I was weary and disheartened, by Mark’s scheming at the Games, by the failure of the treaty with Cerdig. None of them come close to being sufficient or forgivable.

So……. derangement……….moon-sickness……..frenzy. Yes, they go some way to explaining my beguilement, but ultimately I think simply………lust. Lust with all its attendant greed and weakness. Lust, that was already waning by the time I told her about my lands in the spring, radiant in their Solomon’s seal and red poppies……..but a lust that had already wrought such indelible hurt……..

Now, of course, I recognise the differences – as I should have certainly done then too. Lust is never love. Love is the complete surrender of your heart to another with the security of knowing they will treat it better than you will. Love is caring, friendship, commitment and trust. Kai is love…….

Lust slakes the body only, disdaining the spirit - while love lifts your soul, making it wing. Lust is demanding and possessive, green-eyed and grudging. Lust was Benedicta…..

Last night, after I stupidly returned with Nestor, Kai and I walked down to the palisade, my hand stroking his back under cover of his cloak. All the comfort I could offer in full sight of the sentries. I said sorry for being so thoughtless . He was reassuring and dismissive. But, after all this time, I can always tell……

And when I saw him becoming deliberately drunken, I matched him mead cup for cup. So that we both ended the night insensible beside the hearth – and Kai, I am sure, suffered a vicious Roman nightmare……..

Thankfully today is a straightforward one of inspecting and tallying. Kindling to assess. Straw to bundle. Measures of horse feed to reckon. At some point Luc and Cedric come tumbling past, attempting to emulate the acrobatic feats of the troupes at the Cornish markets. Llud sees off Nestor, back to the Greek trader. All in all, quite an ordinary day.

Then I happen to look up and see my big brother. Kai, all golden and shirtless, glowing in the heat of the forge. He catches my gaze, grins and winks - and, within my chest, my heart does exactly what our boys were doing earlier………..No ordinary day at all. An utterly extraordinary day, as each one is now……..simply because Kai is here and Kai is mine………

After the midday meal, Mark and his man prepare to return to his kingdom. My big brother is standing with him, laughing at some joke Mark has made about Hereward – never a difficult task – when Llud taps my elbow quietly. “Arthur.” Our father hands me a sack that smells of newly roasted chicken and a flagon of mead. “The village will be safe for the next day or so and your brother has been a little…….troubled. I’m sure Mark would be glad of your and Kai’s company for part of the way home. And it is still warm enough to sleep below the stars.” He pats my arm affectionately and calls to a passing farm-hand. “My sons’ horses. The king of Cornwall requires an escort……”

 

“So kind of you to ride thus far with me. Another stirring visit to your encampment Arthur. Interesting man that Nestor – and a good listener for a Roman.” Mark gives us the benefit of his gleaming white teeth. “Michael and I can probably shift for ourselves from here on though. I certainly wouldn’t want to be an………..encumbrance.” Wishes for a safe journey and a successful negotiation of terms with Cerdig are exchanged. Greetings to Eithna and the children.

Wheeling his horse, Mark begins to canter through the trees beside the river, his groom already a considerable distance ahead – then he halts, looking solemn. “Now you two, remember……..don’t do anything on the way home that I wouldn’t do.” His ringing laughter echoes resoundingly westwards………

“I’m sorry.” Arthur nestles closer against me beside the fire, his black head cradled below my throat, his beautiful tight arse burrowing into my hot groin. I stroke back his silky hair, softly kiss his forehead. “If you say that one more time, my love, I’m going to cheerfully clout you. You don’t have to be sorry for offering a merchant one night of village hospitality – although you may have to apologise to Nestor one day for making him listen to braggart Mark in the guest quarters.”

Arthur’s blue eyes shimmer with fervour. “But, Benedicta has come and gone twice now. The first time……” He shudders violently. “No threat at all the second, yet still creating desolation………. and Nestor was bound to be a reminder……I’m sorry my heart.” I smile contentedly. Roman shrews can dance with the devil for all I care in this moment…….. “What did I say? Now, you’ve left me absolutely no choice. Little brother, I am going to have to clout you and soundly too.”

Savagely I cover his ripe mouth with mine, slipping a hand inside his breeches, caressing that succulent soaring cock. Arthur grins against my lips, his warm moist tongue encircling mine. “Big brother, I fear that I have been very imprudent - perhaps you had better……. clout me again.” And so, without delay, I do……….

 

All day he has been looking at me as if I am not quite real – no doubt the aftermath of the nightmare. Yet nothing could be more real than this………. nothing has ever been realer and nothing ever will be. I caress his throbbing balls, feeling them swell against my palm, lush and fiery. “It’s a good thing that…… I’ve owned you for life…… since Modred’s field.”

My breathing comes in heaving gasps as Kai rains kisses across my neck, smiles wickedly, moulds his mouth around one tingling nipple, starts sucking, wheedling with the tip of his slippery tongue. “Fuck I love you,……… big brother ………… fuck …………. fuck……… fuck …….. let me………… you ………… forever…………..”

My Kai………..Once again you vanquish my lips, whispering fiercely that you love me, you love us……….you want more of us, now, for always.

I kneel, take your golden spear of fragrant flesh within my mouth, loving the feel of you as you fill me up completely, sweeping my throat, hard as granite, luscious as honey. Licking, supping, coddling, I feel your fingers tangling in my hair, your teeth spiking the skin of my shoulder.

Looking up, I hold ferociously on to us, ascending the promise of your stormy coming, your beautiful gaze possessing mine, unwavering. Your eyes darken and narrow, your lean muscles clench, thrusting that bourgeoning shaft against the ticklish arch of my mouth……..so that I am laughing as your musky juices - more pleasing than the finest fruit syrup or berry nectar – douse my throat…………

Smiling, I soak two fingers in your hot seed, stroking the rich cream playfully across your lips – but you take my hand and glide it tenderly downwards, offering your whole self to me, spreading your silken arse cheeks.

Your hole is welcoming and warm as I place my mouth over it, sucking gently, elating in the vibration of your low moaning. Then I slide in my two sodden fingers up to the knuckle, pressing firmly, haloing and rippling your dusky sweetness.

Vehemently your sinews pulse and seethe, pushing my fingers further inside you, fastening around their wet nuzzling. I start licking franticly around your taut pucker, straining to taste you, listening to your joyful whimpers. Your tight bud twitches frenetically against my tongue………

Slowly I enter you, feeling the head of my ravenous aching prick writhing past your supple muscular ring, brushing the walls of your grappling arse. The heat around my cock is so intense, your gripping so rigid that I am almost engulfed in an agony of exquisite pleasure…………

Suddenly you buck, surrendering to the swell, relinquishing control, ramming my trembling fingers around your replenished manhood.

You spur me……… rout me…….bellow your love………cast me headlong into the wondrous crest…...

We becomes us………

Under the shimmering stars, the ebony night sky, you fuck me as I fuck you………..we make love to us, for us…………..we anoint forever…….

 

I have always loved watching Arthur sleep, huddled against me among the sheepskins, his brow smooth, looking so young and peaceful and breathtakingly beautiful. In a moment, if I am not heedful, desire will overwhelm me again and I will be utterly lost……

Looking at him, lying here now with me, simply reminds me what a moon-blasted fool I am to hark back to the past, worrying so at ancient scabs. I trust in Arthur’s love completely and am not afraid of ever forsaking it again. Those stupid forebodings were crushed long ago.

Perhaps though, keen-edged reminders, like Nestor’s visit, do serve one worthwhile purpose – although we may not always be appreciative of remembering when our hearts chafed raw. They remind us that what we have is irredeemably precious, to be cherished beyond measure, never to be complacently squandered.

Readying for sleep myself, I pull him closer, whisper my lips against his soft hair, contentedly close my eyes………

Beloved little brother……. the morning that Llud and I first see her, I was trying to fathom who I really am. And, now, indubitably I know………

Who I am………..Kai who is a Saxon by birth, a Celt by persuasion and faith. My brother’s lieutenant and axe-arm. The son of formidable Llud, the Silver-Handed. Husband of sweet Lenni. Father of three handsome sons and one adored daughter. Brother by marriage to spirited Rowena. Uncle to her three treasured children…….I am tenacious and faltering……..clumsy and sturdy……….impatient and unwavering………eternally in love……….and until the end of time, I am Arthur’s heart.


End file.
